Schumer criticizes railroads over safety

Schumer criticizes railroads over safety U.S. Sen. Charles E. Schumer accused railroads of turning a blind eye to safety and allowing infrastructure to degrade.

Schumer

   “Despite record business and profits, the industry’s safety record has grown deplorably worse,” he claimed in testimony before the Senate Commerce Committee’s Subcommittee on Surface Transportation and Merchant Marine Infrastructure,
   Schumer had called for Congressional hearings after a CSX train derailed and caught fire near Oneida, N.Y. on March 14. His office said that from 2000-2006 there were 572 rail accidents in communities across upstate New York, causing nearly $34 million in damages.
   Schumer is author of the Rail Crossing and Hazardous Materials Transport Act, which sets tougher minimum and maximum fines for fatal accidents and establishes new requirements for investigations, inspections and the use of new safety technology.
   The legislation aims to crack down on negligent railroad companies and require the broader use of modern technology to protect the public from more fatal crossing and hazardous materials accidents, Schumer said.
   Derailments in the first quarter of this year are up 8 percent from the same period 10 years ago, jumping from 280 derailments to more than 300.
   “The current crisis lies in the decrepit state of our nation’s rail lines. No state has seen the effects of this more than my home state of New York,” he said. “This year has seen a rash of dangerous derailments across the state that could have caused serious harm.”
   But Edward R. Hamberger, chief executive officer of the Association of American Railroads, said at the same hearing that “the overall U.S. rail industry safety record is excellent” and that “in aggregate 2006 was the safest year for railroads ever.”
   Citing data from the Federal Railway Administration, he said “the rail employee casualty rate in 2006 was the lowest in history, having fallen 81 percent since 1980. Likewise, the grade crossing collision rate in 2006 was the lowest ever, having fallen 76 percent since 1980. And from 1980 to 2006, railroads reduced their overall train accident rate by 69 percent. The train accident rate in 2006 was just fractionally higher than the record low.”